A couple of months ago I came across a new system called “Real Time Games”. The idea behind this system was that GPS tracking devices would be put in Formula 1 cars and then as the cars race the data would be streamed to a company who would then allow you to play live against the real F1 drivers. Imagine racing around a track on your Playstation 3 actually playing against Lewis Hamilton who is driving on track in the F1 final. That would certainly be a step beyond hard on the difficulty setting level. As well as tracking data about where the drivers are on the track, the weather could also be a contributing factor. Rather then the computer randomly selecting a weather settings you would actually race in the current race conditions. One last feature of this system is that the data from previous races can be loaded up so you can play historical races too and gain that level of realism that is far beyond AI.
The system is made by iOpener and is something I am looking forwards to seeing come live.
What other games could use this feature? I like the idea of playing against someone professional “live” so to speak.
Via: Real-Time-Games
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
I’m less sure about the cool.
What we really appreciate in good AI is its ability to react to the players actions. Its not just about challenge, the fact that your actions in the world change the way the NPCs react is really important to the sense of immersion.
As your not there, the drivers couldn’t compete with you. It would be like being a ghost racer.
Then again, it would be pretty awesome to play with the real race on TV next to your screen…
You are correct, a, AI is the thing to look for in games rather than playing against live people that may not be really aware of your presence. In that sense, looking forwards to beat Lewis Hamilton in F1 races or the LA Lakers in the championship, or even battling against a team of USMC soldiers feel quite unrealistic as they would not react to you.
However, you can go for something closer and use RTG to monitor behavior on people. Like maybe acceleration, breaking, turning and reaction times on race cars, how the ballers of the Lakers move on the court along with their skills, and then how each Marine deal with a combat situation and how good is he at it. Looking at things from that point brings RTG back to a game’s common AI use, statistics or fixed behavior patterns.
The technology does have potential, but there is a need to make sure people do get that level of realism that matches up or surpasses what AI alone is capable of doing right now.
As stated above the way the AI reacts to you is extremely important. But i’m sure that anyone who has spent hours chasing ‘ghost cars’ around tracks on Gran Turismo trying to beat lap records or drive the perfect lap will tell you that it can be both totally immersive and highly enjoyable.
I think that the ability to race in real time against real F1 drivers would be pretty cool but would mainly be a gimmick, the real replay value for the game would be the ability to re-run a race over and over again so as to have the ability to learn to drive the track like the pro’s and see if you can beat their times.
Also could you imagine if there was say a multi car crash during a F1 race, If you were playing a replay of the race you could then park your car up at the point of the crash (a lap before it happens of course) and then watch it unfold from some pretty unique angles.
Im sure that F1 teams would find the data from such a game very useful indeed!